The community is invited to two special Santa Barbara City College fall 2013 presentations featuring nationally renowned authors.
Sponsored by the SBCC English Department, both events are underwritten through the generosity of author and poet Diana Raab.
Tim O’Brien, author of The Things They Carried, one of the landmark books about the Vietnam War, will host a question-and-answer session about his work at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 24 in SBCC’s Administration Building, Room 211.
An American novelist and recipient of numerous national literary awards and prizes, O’Brien’s book The Things They Carried is a collection of semi-autobiographical interrelated short stories based on his own wartime experiences in Vietnam.
It is also the subject of this year’s Santa Barbara Reads, the community-wide reading program sponsored by the Santa Barbara Library designed to encourage the exchange of idea, stimulate critical thinking and spark a public conversation.
Maxine Hong Kingston, best known for her contributions to Chinese-American literature and the author of The Woman Warrior, will read from her work at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Nov. 8 at the SBCC Garvin Theatre on West Campus.
Kingston is professor emerita at her alma mater, UC Berkeley, and has written three novels and several works of nonfiction about Chinese immigrants’ experiences living in the United States. The Woman Warrior focuses on the role of gender and ethnicity and their impact on women’s lives.
Kingston is the recipient of several national literary awards.
— Joan Galvan is a public information officer for SBCC.